FashBlog.com

Shopping for clothing for my twelve-year-old daughter has become, in a word, interesting. I have two daughters, one of who is very fashion conscious and hip. She knows what to wear, how to wear it, and how to look good while still remaining modest. She's only eleven. But the twelve-year-old has always been more the tomboy type, wearing clothes only because they're necessary. She's never cared about fashion, color coordination or mismatching patterns. Comfort has been the name of the game for my twelve-year-old.

At age five, she wore those cute little leggings that were in style then (and still are for little girls). She wore long shirts and sweaters with them and looked adorable; not that she cared - she wore them because they felt good. By the time she was about eight-years-old, my comfort-seeking daughter was playing soccer with a recreational league team, and she discovered sweat pants. She loved sweat pants. Not only did she wear them once the fall soccer season had finished, she wore them all winter, through the spring, and even for most of the hot summer, except when I made her take them off and wear shorts. Some of the sweats we cut off into shorts and she was quite happy about that.

This daughter, much to her chagrin, began developing early. At the age of ten, it was clear that we had to go shopping for a bra. She wanted no part of this and insisted on wearing an undershirt. Thankfully, there are such things as sports bras, which were just her thing. I found some one day while I was shopping without her, she gladly took them, and I haven't heard a negative word about bras since; though she still reverts to undershirts when she thinks no one is noticing.

So today, my casual daughter is a voluptuous twelve-year-old, standing at a regal 5'5" tall, with an hour glass figure that I'm still hoping to grow for myself. She has very long, thick, curly, dark brown hair (almost black) with very pale skin and dark brown eyes. This isn't just a mom talking here - she's a knockout. Up until just a few months ago, I was still reminding her to put on deodorant, to take a shower, to wash her hair, to brush her hair, and to put on socks that match. But over the past couple of months, perhaps sometime in the summer, something began to change. She still prefers comfort above most things, but my tomboy daughter suddenly wanted to buy blue jeans: for horseback riding, she claimed. Next she wanted to buy some black boots, because she'd seen The Matrix and thought they looked cool. Out of the blue, her shirts went from giant, comfortable hooded sweatshirts to v-necked sweaters with cute t-shirts underneath. She went from her signature pony tail to long flowing locks held back partially by a large clip. We've even seen glimpses of make-up.

What has happened to our little girls is that she's turning into a woman before my very eyes. For a while there, I wasn't sure she would. I didn't care and I didn't push; if she wanted to be a tomboy forever, that's ok by me. But suddenly I'm living with this innocent, care free twelve-year-old who looks eighteen. She likes shopping for clothes now and she looks simply beautiful. Still, she won't touch anything but sports bras, and the only buys the cute clothes that are comfortable. After all, she still has her standards.